Everett, Wash.
Published: Wednesday, November 29, 2006

Truth is, equal opportunity doesn't yet exist in America

John Burbank / Syndicated Columnist

 Last week, I was in New England visiting my family. I looked around for my old newspaper, the Middletown Press. But I couldn't find it, so I asked a cashier, and he pulled out a tabloid. I said, "This isn't the Middletown Press," but he said, "Oh, yes, it is."

I put down 50 cents and looked through 24 pages of ads, cheap photos, and incredibly superficial and biased reporting. I gave it back to the cashier and told him he could resell it, since it had no value to me.

Local newspapers are threatened every day in our country. Bigger metropolitan papers gobble them up. They lose readership to the Internet, television, general malaise. They are undercut by a media culture of sound bites.

Good regional papers make their readers scratch their heads, wonder and think. They can create a vibrant debate about their local schools, businesses, levy votes and elections for city council.

The most prevalent criticism of the political vision that underlies my commentaries rests on the assertion that each of us is solely responsible for how we succeed or fail. Government has no business in providing the minimal foundations for our success.

This philosophy also endorses the inequalities of opportunity that are embedded in our economy. It's your fault if your job pays you only $10 an hour. It's your fault if you don't have health insurance. It's your fault if you get laid off.

In short, in the face of economic insecurity, suck it up!

On the other hand, if you make six figures a year, own your home and a second home, don't have one fancy car but three, that indicates that you did your homework. You got your just reward; you owe nothing to society, nothing to the community and nothing to others. You figured out how to make it and you did. Congratulations!

But you don't get anywhere just by yourself. Every day you depend on the infrastructure of government; the services of others; and the build-up of education, inventions, technology and investments from one generation to the next. Who reaps these benefits as a windfall of our economic progress? All of us, to some degree. Those of us who are already privileged, well positioned, well educated, and just plain lucky are most likely to reap the biggest benefits. Those who aren't are apt to lose out on a lot.

In today's economy, the divisions of wealth and privilege have been magnified, so that the income of the top 1,000 families is soaring, the top 1 percent is doing extremely well and the top 20 percent is just fine, while middle-class families are faced with growing uncertainty. That's no way to build a democracy.

Making do defines middle-class economics now. Your employer cuts health benefits for your spouse - maybe she can go without for a few months. College tuition is too high? Maybe one more college loan will get your daughter through. Why not pile on more credit card debt? We have an entire middle class taking risks, not for entrepreneurial progress, but just to get by.

What would happen if we didn't have to worry about health coverage, high-quality K-12 education, college tuition or secure pensions? Would that be the end of the world, completely sapping entrepreneurial talent, making us all indolent dwellers of a nanny state? If you believe that fear and uncertainty are the platform for progress, then keeping the majority in a state of insecurity might be a good thing. It could make them more quiescent, less demanding workers. It can also send a message: Don't bother.

Prosperity is not based on the privilege of the few, but the well-being of the many. That's why government and democracy are fundamental - they can ensure that all citizens enjoy basic economic security and educational opportunity.

America is founded on the revolutionary idea that government should enable each of us, as a society and as individuals, to strive for "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness." Only a democratic government can ensure that opportunity, with a foundation of education for all children, health coverage for all citizens and security in old age for all retirees.

Now that would be a civil society.

John Burbank, executive director of the Economic Opportunity Institute (www.eoionline.org), writes every other Wednesday. Write to him in care of the institute at 1900 Northlake Way, Suite 237, Seattle, WA 98103. His e-mail address is john@eoionline.org.
© 2009The Daily Herald Co., Everett, WA